


Concerning Timetravel

by InkFire_Scribe



Series: Changing Times [1]
Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: F/M, Female Bilbo Baggins/Thorin Oakenshield, Fix-It, Genderswap, Rule 63, The Ring is not a Sonic Screwdriver, Time Travel, Time Travel Fix-It, bilbo is a woman, fem!Bilbo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-05
Updated: 2018-12-05
Packaged: 2019-09-12 06:41:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 4,406
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16868020
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InkFire_Scribe/pseuds/InkFire_Scribe
Summary: A fic in answer to the question: What if the Ring didn't make you invisible, but instead transported you to another time? This is a rabbit hole that I tried hard not to get lost in. I still struggle with it if I think about it too much.





	1. Borrowing the Ring

Frodo could feel his heart rabbiting frantically against his ribs, and pressed his body a little more firmly against the wall. His bedroom was wood-paneled, the bed covered with a patchwork quilt as old as he was, sewn by an aunt or cousin on the Brandybuck side of the family. He'd brought it with him when Aunt Bilbo had adopted him. It was a familiar thing. A comforting thing. Cautiously, the halfling edged away from the wall, still looking about with his eyes nearly starting from his head, as though expecting to see something horrible coming through the door or peering through the window. Throwing himself recklessly over the last little distance between himself and the safety of his old quilt, Frodo squeezed his eyes shut and rolled himself in the clean, slightly dusty smell of summer. Bilbo must have aired the bedding today. 

It seems like ages before he was calm again. Now he was absolutely positive, beyond even a sliver of a doubt, that "borrowing" his aunt's ring had been a terrible idea. 

He wondered if Bilbo knew what the ring did. She had to. She'd had it for years before he was even born (he thought so, anyway). 

When Frodo heard his aunt singing in the garden, he hastened to put the ring back where he'd found it - in a little box on the desk in her study. It was her treasure from that adventure he wasn't old enough to hear about yet. But he would ask. He needed to know. What if he knew, and she didn't? What if she just thought it was a pretty ring? 

What if she got hurt?

The boy was hardly more than a faunt. He was only 21, and yet he had such a strong sense of familial duty that he knew he wouldn't be able to rest until he had confirmed whether or not his aunt was safe. 


	2. Too Many Questions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Frodo gets some answers. Eventually.

"Aunt Bilbo?" Frodo slid his hands into the oven mitts she handed him and went obediently to pull the pie from the oven. It smelled savory and delicious. Maybe a mince meat or pot pie? It was getting colder outside. It would be their birthday soon. 

"Yes, my boy?" Bilbo had returned to mixing a dark, nutty dough. It would be a wonderful sweet bread when she was done, but right now it looked like a gooey blob while she worked the egg into the mixture. 

"Could you tell me more about your adventure? With the dragon and the dwarves?" Something about what he said must have been funny, because Bilbo laughed. She didn't lose the rhythm of her mixing, though, and the soft squelch-squelch of her hands in the dough didn't miss a beat. 

"That's not a story for working, and especially not for cooking! No, my lad, that story will have to wait. But I can tell you about Elrond Halfelven, and his house in the valley if Rivendell." She didn't wait to see if he was interested. Off she went on her story, and Frodo knew she would be happily occupied for a while. It wasn't what he wanted to know, though, and his anxiety about keeping her safe made it hard to pay attention to what she was saying. 

The following evening, she put him off in the same way, claiming it wasn't a tale for a chill autumn night, but she could tell him about the time her cousin Paladin stole an entire tray of pies from her windowsill. It was a good story, but again, it wasn't the one he wanted to hear. 

Frodo was persistent. He asked almost every day, any time he could sneak the question in. During breakfast, while cleaning up, in the afternoon, before and after their mid-afternoon rest, during and after supper. It was frustrating, but it was also really exciting, in a way. He liked the challenge, and since the ring hadn't been back in its box since the day he'd "borrowed" it, he hadn't thought about it as much (though he did check the box frequently). 

It wasn't until a week before their Birthday, when Gandalf came to visit, that Frodo got even a hint that he was succeeding. Gandalf and Bilbo were closeted in her study for hours, leaving Frodo to fend for himself as friends and family came to RSVP for the party, inquire after his health, and try to get a peek at this year's presents. Bilbo was notorious for giving only the best gifts, and they were never the old ones (unless she thought it was particularly funny or fitting). When he'd finally gotten rid of the last of the Bolgers, who had each wanted their own copy of the party's menu so they might "improve" on it before the big day, Frodo sat down in the entryway, wishing he could block the door closed. 

Just as he was eyeing the chipped edges of the beloved green door and thinking that it would need a fresh coat of paint before the party, Frodo heard the thump of approaching boot heels. Gandalf was standing over him in a minute, smiling down at him with that kindly old gaffer smile he had when things were about to change completely and it was all his fault. 

"I'm told you've been unusually full of questions recently." The old man stooped and offered the halfling a hand to help him to his large, furry feet. Frodo accepted his help and stood, trying not to look sheepish. 

"Auntie told you all about that, huh?" 

"Yes, she did. She also told me you've been at it for weeks. When I happened to bring it up in conversation, it was like I'd held a knife to her. 'Alright, alright, I'll tell you - but so help me if you bring it up again I'll put peppers in your soup!' You must have done a rare good job of it, my lad." 

Frodo wasn't sure whether to feel proud or guilty. Torn between the two, he mostly felt confused, and didn't much appreciated the old gentleman's laughter as he shook his head. 

"Bilbo will share the story with you soon enough, I'm sure. Now that she's told me, it'll be easier for her to tell it to someone else. And I daresay she'll like you as an audience far better than a crotchety old man." Gandalf patted Frodo on the back and, with a very pleased smiled, made his way toward the front door. On "errands," probably, though Frodo had never quite figured out what it was Gandalf was actually doing when he went wandering about the Shire. 

He was right. As usual. 

Not too long after the Birthday party and when all the friends and family had gone home (a process that only stretched over two or three days) Frodo heard his aunt calling to him from her study. Frodo carefully bookmarked his spot with a pressed leaf and followed the sound of her voice. Poking his head around the corner, he stepped in when he saw his aunt's face brighten at the sight of him. It would have been a different story entirely if she had scowled at him. If she'd heard about last week's deal with Merry Brandybuck for some of Farmer Maggot's mushrooms, then maybe she wouldn't have been so pleased. 

"Good. I thought for a minute you were out and about. You and I have a lot to talk about." 

"We do?" Frodo's heart lifted a little. Would she finally tell him the story he'd been waiting for for so long? Maybe. Then again, maybe she would tell him a different story altogether. 

"Yes. You've been pestering me for more than a month to tell you about my old adventure, so we might as well get it done now. It won't do you any good to wait more - I think you might explode if you did, confusticating lad that you are." Bilbo paused to smile at him and gestured to a chair. "It's a long story, so you might as well make yourself comfortable." 


	3. The Magic Thing

She didn't know. Frodo chewed his lip. It bothered him, in a way. She didn't know, and thought that it only made her invisible. But he hadn't noticed himself turning invisible. Then again, maybe he had and he just hadn't noticed it. 

The part that bothered him was that his Aunt might still think that it was a SAFE thing, but he knew it wasn't. He had used the Ring and it had put him in a place that he almost hadn't escaped from. He had nearly died (of this he was absolutely certain) and if he hadn't been fast enough, if it had taken him only a couple seconds longer to open that door.... 

But how would she react if he told her what her ring really did? What if she didn't believe him? Or worse, what if she did, and wanted to know how he knew? What if she figured out that he had borrowed it without asking first, and got angry with him? Frodo remembered all too clearly the time she had thought her ring was lost and had become so upset (nearly angry) that she had sent him outside and told him not to come back until she had found it. It had been raining that day. 

That was how he'd known it was a Magic thing. 

Because his Aunt Bilbo - she wasn't the sort to send anyone out into the rain. Not even someone she didn't like. She said she loved him. He believed her. (Lobelia had stayed an extra hour one day because of a drizzle, and she'd had an umbrella.) 

So... what was he supposed to do? Frodo spent a long time walking in the forests, over the hills, along the river, through the fields. But no matter how many lengths, or miles, or leagues he walked, his thoughts didn't get any clearer. 

He wanted to tell her to keep her safe, but he didn't want to tell her because she would be angry with him. So what could he do? Tell or don't tell. Those were the only options. 

Or were they?

Frodo was halfway to Frogmorton when he stopped, staring up at the drifting, fluffy white clouds overhead. They were beginning to collect to the east and heading his way. It didn't feel like rain, but it was starting to look like it. 

If he had to either tell or don't tell, why was Bilbo the only one he could tell? Surely there was someone else - Gandalf, maybe, or cousin Paladin, or someone - that could tell her for him, and they could explain everything so he wouldn't have to be the one she was angry at. It would be mean to do that to one of their cousins, but he was sure Gandalf would be able to understand it. Frodo's expression brightened as he thought this over. Yes. Gandalf would help him. When the Wizard visited again. Maybe next year. 

Then again... that was a long time to wait. What if something happened before then?

Frodo's smile faded as he thought of that. He didn't want anything to happen to his aunt, especially not when it was something he might have prevented. There were a lot of things he could say for himself, but not that he was one that would allow things to happen. Not when he was responsible to stop them. Frodo set his jaw. There was only one choice, then. He would have to tell his aunt himself and deal with the consequences like a grown gentlehobbit. If nothing else, he was sure that his Brandybuck relatives would be happy to see him again when Aunt Bilbo threw him out. In the rain.


	4. A Night That Smells of Hay

There was no point in delaying. Frodo steeled himself as he stood outside her study, preparing himself. This could go badly wrong. On the other hand, it would keep her safe. That was more important than anything else. It had to be more important, or he would lose what little courage he had managed to gather on the way back to the beautiful old hobbit hole. After a brief struggle, he set his jaw and knocked on the door.

There was no answer.

Frowning, uncertain, Frodo knocked again. Again, there was no answer. With a hand on the latch, he opened the door cautiously, peering around the pale yellow-green wood into the room beyond. Empty. That was strange. Bilbo almost never closed this room unless she was within. Except…

With a thrill of anticipation, of fearful adrenaline at what thoughts had slipped unbidden into his mind, the young hobbit crept into the study. There was the map of Middle-Earth that Bilbo had painstakingly copied in Rivendell months before he'd been adopted. There was a half-finished letter to Balin, who Frodo now understood was a dwarf from the company of Thorin Oakenshield, dead before he had even been born, killed in the Battle of the Five Armies. And there, sitting on the topmost shelf of the beautiful desk, the polished box no larger than his hand, securely latched with a little bronze leaf, exquisitely shaped. A present from another of the dwarves, he guessed, though he couldn't think which one, if indeed she'd ever told him.

Frodo licked his lips nervously and glanced back at the half-open door. No sign of Bilbo. Quickly, he reached up to the box. The only thought in his mind was to see it again. Maybe hold it for a minute. Then he would talk to her. He would go find her, wherever she was, and they would have this out in the open. The secret was doing him no favors.

The Ring lay nestled in the white velvet inside the box, gleaming perfectly round and flawless. Seeing it again was like balm on an aching burn. With a smile, he pulled it out of the box and felt the weight of it in his palm. He couldn't blame her, really, for keeping it to herself. Who would want to share it? She would definitely be angry if she caught him in here with her Ring. Frodo's hand closed around the gold thing and without thinking, he set the box down on the desk. He didn't think, not even now, that "borrowing" the Ring again was a good idea. But the shadowy concept of an idea, still nebulous in his unsettled mind, was beginning to niggle at him. A thought that maybe Bilbo wasn't the  _ only _ one he could talk to about this.

If it could take him back… by the Valar, why couldn't he talk to one of Bilbo's precious dwarves about it? Why couldn't he have them tell her? If he made it properly cryptic, the would never know - he could tell them and they could tell her and she would figure it out herself. It would be fine!

Frodo grinned, relieved and even a little proud of this idea, this way around telling Bilbo directly. After all, it was safer for him, and it still achieved his ultimate end of making things better for his aunt. All he needed to do was make sure he went back to a time that wasn't so dangerous as the time before.

No battles, that's for sure. And who could he talk to? Balin? Probably. Or maybe Ori. Bilbo had shown a soft spot for him, and Frodo was under the impression that he had been younger than the others by some years. Still, there was no need to stand around thinking about it when he could suit actions to words. With a smile, he slipped the Ring onto his finger, thinking specifically of a night when there was no fighting - a night in the longhouse of a friend.


	5. Riddles in the Dark

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which "Bilbo" sings a new song and is happy with it.

A night that smelled of hay and honey. Frodo was standing in the longhouse of Beorn the skinchanger. It had been his favorite part of the story. He heard the discordant snoring of a dozen exhausted dwarves, and the softer but still audible snores of a hobbit, and thought to himself that this was not only impossible, it was also amazing. He felt triumphant in a way he didn't at all deserve, since it clearly wasn't of his own doing. He had a magic item, that was all.

But it was a still a wonderful, powerful feeling.

"Baggins?" The low, rumbling voice of a dwarf came to him out of the darkness, and Frodo stiffened, ears twitching. He had no idea which dwarf it was, and hoped no one would... would what? He looked enough like his aunt that maybe they wouldn't be able to tell the difference in the dark.

"Sorry. I... couldn't sleep."

There was a moment's silence, punctuated by the quiet snap of the fire on the hearth. "Much has happened." That was all the dwarf said about it. Frodo turned a little, identifying the direction of the sound and finding the gleam of eyes in the darkness. Blue eyes. Like his. The young halfling was a little disconcerted, but pushed the thought aside. It wasn't worth thinking about right now. He had a task to accomplish, then he could go home before Aunt Bilbo realized the Ring was missing.

"Maybe a song would help?" Perhaps the suggestion was ridiculous, but it seemed very Bilboish to him, and the dwarf didn't seem to think it strange.

"I think that would suit just fine. Let's hear it. Quietly, burglar."

Frodo decided this dwarf was imperious, and didn't give much (any) thought to anyone other than himself. Still, it was well enough. So, even though the song was a bit of a work in progress, he opened his mouth and sang. Softly.

Gleaming gold in darkness cold

Deep in tunnels thick with fear

I felt the chill near freeze my will

In darkest tunnels far from here

 

I found a thing, a golden ring

Strange it was in such a place

But grasping hands in shadow lands

Near beat us in that desperate race

 

A key to time, this find of mine

Now it ever sends me back

These mem'ries aren't mine, you see

And time I'll never, ever lack

When Frodo finished his song, he was actually a little pleased that it had turned out so well, all things considered. "Remember that for me, please," he whispered, and slipped quietly behind a pillar. Grasping the Ring on his finger, he paused just long enough to hear the heavy shifting of a dwarf getting to his feet in the straw. Then the young halfling pulled the Ring off. Instantly, he was back in the sunlit study. Hastily, he dropped the Ring back into the bod and clipped the leaf-shaped clasp shut before turning to the door to escape - only to come face to face with his aunt.


	6. Changes and Confessions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the phrase "frantic honesty" makes the author smile.

Bilbo's eyes were fixed on him, one clear hazel, the other cloudy white with a darker section in the middle, where the iris and pupil had been covered by scar tissue. She had told him once that she was "pretty much blind" in her bad eye, but he had the sneaking suspicion that she could see somewhat - shapes and light at very least, since she always seemed to know what he was doing on her blind side, even if he was being extra quiet. Now, as she looked at him intently, it was just as disconcerting (if not more so) to see as the wolf-like blue eyes that had glinted at him out of the darkness so few minutes and so many years ago. 

"You've been playing with my Ring," said Bilbo quietly. "Explain yourself." Her voice was soft, but there was a dangerous note to it. She was angry, and was still deciding about whether or not to act on that anger.

"I... uh... I didn't... I was just....." Frodo felt like his face was about to burst into flame, but he couldn't lie. "I was trying to protect you." That didn't make any sense at all. If he was lucky, she might decide understanding what he meant was more important than punishing him for his trespass. 

"Explain," she repeated, and there was no mistaking that she would have her answer before she even considered letting him out of the study. Frodo lowered his head, wishing the floor would open up and swallow him whole. With one dirty toe, he nudged a loose scrap of parchment that had fallen to the floor. 

"I learned something about your Ring, and I wanted to be sure you knew it, because it might be dangerous if you didn't. But I was scared that you would be angry. So I came here hoping I could talk to you about it, but you weren't here… but the Ring was, and I thought… maybe someone else… could tell you." The admission smacked of cowardice, and Frodo was old enough to dislike it, even if he was barely into his tweens. Bilbo sighed, and it was a long minute before the young halfling had the courage to lift his gaze to her face again. His aunt was shaking her head, smiling a hard little smile that made her blind eye seem even more intimidating than usual. 

"Might be dangerous, hm? Thought you knew something I didn't about my RIng?" Her tone was a lilting, almost sing-song remonstration. He didn't know how to interpret it at all. 

"Y-yes, ma'am." Maybe if he just agreed with her, then she would understand that he was sorry and wouldn't punish him too harshly for it. 

He tried not to look at her too much, but as the silence stretched on, it was harder and harder not to glance into her eyes now and again. She was waiting for him to say something, or at least that was what it felt like. He didn't know what to say, but the expectant silence was too much for the youngster's guilty conscience. 

"The first time I borrowed your Ring, it took me back in time to a place where there were big monsters trying to kill everything! I might have been killed if I hadn't tripped over my own feet! I didn't want that to happen to you, and all you ever said was that it made you invisible. I didn't want you to get hurt!" 

Bilbo was very still as she looked at him. His confession, for all its frantic honesty, had unsettled her. 

"It was you." 

Frodo shifted his weight nervously, not at all sure what she meant. He didn't say anything, and she went on. 

"It was you that warned Thorin about my Ring." 

It was strange to have her speak in the tone that implied reaching far back into her memory, about something he had only just done. Almost nothing he did was very important or memorable (unless it was the sort of thing that would get him in trouble, and maybe this was one of those). 

"Yes, ma'am." 

"I didn't know it then. I hadn't had the time to know what it was, let alone put it on. But I learned after. And your song helped." 

"So… you knew?"

"I know now. Maybe I did before. Maybe I didn't." She studied him for a long minute before she nodded her head slowly. "You may have changed things, then. I recall I knew when I changed things... but I don't remember what I changed, anymore." Bilbo was staring into the middle distance now. Maybe if she hadn't been standing between him and the only exit, Frodo might have made a run for it. But she was, and so he was stuck. He heard the heavy footfalls of someone approaching down the hall - someone in boots. Gandalf? He felt a thrill that might have been fear, or hope. It was hard to tell when his mind was still tangled up in being then and being now and here and there and all over the place. 

"Bilbo?" The figure that stepped into the doorway behind his aunt was taller than either of them, but it most certainly wasn't Gandalf. He had the broad features of a dwarf, though he was slender by the standards of that race. His hair was black as black, and his beard was short, plaited into a thick, neat braid that didn't quite touch his chest. Frodo caught his gaze and saw the eyes; blue like a wild thing's, and glinting with the sunlight streaming through the window. The same eyes as had been glinting at him out of the darkness in Beorn's house. 

Frodo felt the world spin madly about him as though he were about to faint. 

"Thorin?" he asked breathlessly. The dwarf frowned at him. 

"Yes, Frodo? Are you alright, lad? You look a little pale." 


	7. Pack Your Things

A dwarf stepped around the corner to look at Frodo with a bemused, slightly concerned look.

"I… changed things." Frodo sounded as stunned as he felt, and that seemed like quite an achievement, at least at the time.

"Did you now?" The dwarf cocked an eyebrow at him, then looked down at Bilbo. "I suppose you know what he's talking about?" Bilbo nodded, giving her dwarf and smile and rocking up onto her toes to peck his cheek with a gentle kiss.

"I do. Now, let's finish getting ready. It's been a good visit, but we'll have to leave by tonight if we're going to meet Ori and Nori in Bree on time."

"Are you sure he'll be alright?" Thorin angled his head slightly toward Frodo, favoring him with another, slightly concerned glance. 

Bilbo nodded. "I'm sure. I'll help him pack, and you can round up the last of our things from the camping pantry. You know where everything is." 

Thorin made a grumbling noise in his throat as he turned away that seemed to mean that he disagreed. "Well, you know ever everything  _ important _ is. Go on, love. I'll see you in a minute." When Thorin and his boots were out of earshot, Bilbo looked at her nephew with a serious expression. 

"If I find you taking my Ring again, I will tie you to a tree and leave you there. Am I understood?" 

Frodo nodded energetically. He knew his aunt well enough to know she didn't make hollow threats. As soon as he'd agreed, a smile spread across her face. "Very good. Now get back to your room and pack your things."


End file.
